Critics Say Massachusetts' New Solar Bill Would Create an Unfair Exchange

New concerns are being raised by solar advocates in Massachusetts about recent solar policy revisions resulting from a landmark agreement between utilities and the solar industry.

The solar bill H.4185 is currently working its way through the state legislature after stakeholders reached common ground.  The agreement was a unique compromise brokered by the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) between the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), the New England Clean Energy Council (NECEC), National Grid, and Northeast Utilities.

The bill makes five changes to existing solar policies:

• Net metering would be unaltered and its cap eliminated.
• Virtual net metering customers would be reimbursed at a lower rate to cover their use of the distribution system.
• The solar renewable energy credit (SREC) incentive system would be replaced by a performance-based, declining tariff incentive.
• All utility customers would be subject to a minimum bill.
• Governor Deval Patrick’s ambitious target of 1,600 megawatts of installed solar capacity would become a legally binding mandate.

But not everyone is happy with the legislation, particularly those involved in the business of trading SRECs.  The proposed solutions offer the solar industry “an unfair exchange of net metering capacity for a centralized incentive program," wrote a group called Massachusetts Stakeholders for Competitive Solar (MSCS) in a letter to legislators.

The bill, MSCS wrote, protects net metering “at the expense of Massachusetts’ highly successful, decentralized SREC program.

Critics Say Massachusetts' New Solar Bill Would Create an Unfair Exchange